Cracking The Obesity Code

Dr. Jason Fung reveals that overproduction of insulin in the body is the root cause of obesity. It also the root cause of obesity-related illnesses including type 2 diab2etes. He explains how to use intermittent fasting to break the cycle of insulin resistance. So people suffer from obesity can reach a healthy weight. The Obesity Code is a book about how to overcome obesity. Featured picture: Book Depository.

Picture 1. Obesity (Pixabay)

What did they say after reading The Obesity Code?

L Parr

My guess is that Dr. Fung will become vilified for several reasons:
1. His plan WORKS WITHOUT MEDICINE.
2. The drug companies will lose a tremendous amount of money.
3. NO SPECIAL FOODS OR SUPPLEMENTS TO BUY.
4. NO ADDED EXPENSES…in fact, MY FOOD BILLS ARE MUCH LOWER.
5. He exposes the fact that this information has been available to the medical community for a long time and no one has acted on it.

I also recommend getting an extra copy for your doctor because they will surely think you are nuts when you tell them what you are doing.I will be eternally grateful to Dr. Fung for giving me the tools to cure my daughter high blood glucose and better serve my patients.

Vivian White

After 15 years of eating less than 1000 calories a day, walking 3 – 5 miles per day, spending 3 days at the gym, doing strength training, doing cardio, and swimming, and constantly gaining weight, THIS IS THE ONLY THING THAT ALLOWED ME TO LOSE WEIGHT.

I am now eating 1100 calories a day and losing 3.5 per week. It is without exercise as I broke my one kneecap and tore my ACL in the other knee. It all has to do with insulin resistance. People who are not resistant can eat and not gain weight, but if you are resistant, just looking at food will cause you to gain.

Check out Dr. Fung on DietDoctor.com. Or you can go to YouTube and search his name and many helpful and explanatory videos will come up.In one month I reversed my diabetes.

I highly recommend this book. Read through all the facts and figures he goes over…It makes managing your weight and your diabetes much easier over your lifetime. It is without much thought once you know how your body reacts to food.

Doctors have recommended a low-fat, caloriereduce diet as the treatment for obesity. It has happened for more than thirty years. Yet the obesity epidemic accelerates. From 1985 to 2011, the prevalence of obesity in Canada tripled, from 6 percent to 18 percent.

This phenomenon is not unique to North America but involves most of the nations of the world. Every person who has used caloric reduction for weight loss has failed.

And, who hasn’t tried it? By every goal measure, this treatment is completely and ineffective. Yet it remains the treatment of choice, defended by nutritional authorities.

Medical treatments get handed down from one generation of doctors to the next despite their lack of effectiveness. The treatment of obesity is one such example.

Like many doctors, Dr. Jason Fung believed that weight gain was a caloric imbalance. That is eating too much and moving too little. But, why did the medication he prescribed—insulin—cause such relentless weight gain?

The major problem is the complete lack of a theoretical framework. The other major barrier to understanding is the focus on short-term studies. Obesity usually takes decades to develop.

We are human beings, and we should consider only human studies. Obesity shares many important similarities and differences with type 2 diabetes.

Why are there doctors who are fat? As authorities in human physiology, doctors should be experts on the causes and treatments of obesity.

It is hardly conceivable that overweight doctors lack the willpower to follow their own advice. This leaves the possibility that the conventional advice is wrong. And if it is, then our entire understanding of obesity flaw.

We must start with the single most important question on obesity or any disease: “What causes it?”

Excess calories may be the proximate cause of weight gain, but not its ultimate cause. What’s the difference between PROXIMATE and ULTIMATE? The proximate cause is immediately responsible. The ultimate cause is what started the chain of events.

Before puberty, boys and girls average the same body-fat percentage. After puberty, women on average carry close to 50 percent more body fat than men. This change occurs despite the fact that men consume more calories on average than women.

Picture 2. A Boy And A Girl (Photo by Ba Phi from Pexels)

But why is this true? Pregnancy also induces significant weight gain. What is the ultimate cause? Again, it is the hormonal changes resulting from the pregnancy.

Picture 3. A Pregnant Woman (Pixabay)

We believe that the solution to obesity is to eat fewer calories. The “authorities” all agree. With all our attention focused on fat, we took our eyes off the ball. Everything was “low fat” or “low cholesterol,” and nobody was paying attention to sugar.

The obesity rates increased, starting almost exactly in 1977. The increase in obesity began with the move toward a low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet. Was it mere coincidence?

It is obvious that obesity runs in families. This is an undeniable fact. The controversy is whether this trend a genetic or an environmental problem.

Families share genetic characteristics that may lead to obesity. But, obesity has become rampant only since the 1970s. Our genes could not have changed within such a short time.

Genetics can explain much of the inter-individual risk of obesity. But it can not explain why entire populations become obese. For these reasons, many consider the current environment the major cause of obesity.

Approximately 70 percent of the variance in obesity is familial. Your parentage determines seventy percent of your tendency to gain weight.

But, it is clear that inheritance cannot be the sole factor leading to the obesity epidemic. The incidence of obesity has been stable over the decades.

Most of the obesity epidemic materialized within a single generation. Our genes have not changed in that time span. How can we explain this contradiction?

The first attempt to explain the genetic basis was the thrifty-gene hypothesis. It became popular in the 1970s. This hypothesis assumes that humans predisposed to gain weight as a survival mechanism.

Bears, along with whales, walruses and other fat animals are fat, but not obese. They suffer no health consequences. They are, in fact, programmed to become fat. We aren’t. In humans, evolution did not favor obesity, but rather, leanness.

Picture 4. Walrus

The thrifty-gene hypothesis doesn’t explain obesity. But what does? We will see in Part 3, “A New Model of Obesity”.

The root cause of obesity is a complex hormonal imbalance. High blood insulin is its central feature.

But inherited factors account for only 70 percent of the tendency to obesity. The other 30 percent of factors are under our control. What should we do to make the most of this? Are diet and exercise the answer?

We see obesity as a result of how people process calories that we can predict a person’s weight by a simple equation:

Calories In – Calories Out = Body Fat

This key equation perpetrates what Dr. Fung call the calorie deception. It is dangerous because it appears so simple and intuitive. But what you need to understand is that there are many false assumptions.

Assumption 1:

Calories In and Calories Out are independent of each other This assumption is a crucial mistake. We’ll see later on in this chapter. Experiments and experience have proven this assumption false.

Caloric intake and expenditure are dependent variables. Decreasing Calories In triggers a decrease in Calories Out. The end result is minimal weight loss.

Picture 5. (UnSplash)

Assumption 2: Basal metabolic rate is stable

We obsess about caloric intake with a thought for caloric expenditure, except for exercise. Measuring caloric intake is simple. But it is complicated to measure the body’s total energy expenditure.

We make a simple but completely erroneous assumption that energy expenditure remains constant except for exercise.

Total energy expenditure is the sum of:

The total energy expenditure can go up or down by as much as 50 percent depending upon the caloric intake as well as other factors.

Picture 6. Exercising (Pixabay)

Assumption 3: We exert conscious control over calories in

Eating is a deliberate act. We assume that eating is a conscious decision and that hunger plays only a minor role in it.

But many overlapping hormonal systems influence the decision of when to eat and when to stop. We decide to eat in response to hunger signals that are hormonally mediated.

We stop eating when the body sends signals of satiety (fullness). The action is hormonally mediated.

Our bodies own an intricate system guiding us to eat or not. Body-fat regulation is under automatic control, like breathing. We do not remind ourselves to breathe, nor do we remind our hearts to beat.

The only way to achieve such control is to have homeostatic mechanisms. Hormones control both Calories In and Calories Out. Obesity is a hormonal, not a caloric, disorder.

Picture 7. Eating (Pexels)

Assumption 4: Fat stores are unregulated

There is the regulator of every single system in the body. Growth hormone regulates growth in height. The hormones insulin and glucagon regulate blood sugars. Testosterone and estrogen regulate sexual maturation. A thyroid stimulating hormone and free thyroxine regulate body temperature. The list is endless.

We believe that the growth of fat cells unregulated. The simple act of eating will result in fat growth. Extra calories will dump into fat cells like doorknobs into a sack. Researchers have proved that this assumption false. New hormonal pathways in the regulation of fat growth are being discovered all the time.

Assumption 5: A calorie is a calorie

This assumption is the most dangerous of all. It’s obviously true. Like a dog is a dog or a desk is a desk. There are many different kinds of dogs and desks, but the simple statement that a dog is a dog is true.

The real issue is this: Are all calories likely to cause fat gain? It implies that the only important variable in weight gain is the total caloric intake. But does a calorie of olive oil cause the same metabolic response as a calorie of sugar?

The answer is NO. These two foods have any measurable differences. Sugar will increase the blood glucose level. And sugar will provoke an insulin response from the pancreas. Olive oil will not.

When the small intestine absorbs olive oil and transports it to the liver, there is no significant increase in blood glucose or insulin. The two different foods evoke different metabolic and hormonal responses.

Researchers have proved that these five assumptions all false. All calories are not likely to cause weight gain. The entire caloric obsession was a fifty-year dead end.

So we must begin again. What causes weight gain?

Picture 9. A Detective Book

This book discusses how to overcome obesity in an interesting way. You will feel like reading a detective book. Dr. Fung explains his thoughts clearly and systematically. If you want to overcome obesity or you want to help your loved one to overcome obesity or type 2 diabetes, this book is for you.

Do you have any problem related with the obesity? How do you maintain your ideal body weight? Please add your comment and I will be more than happy reply to your comment.

46 Replies to “Cracking The Obesity Code”

My dear friend is very overweight and suffers from diabetes. She takes shots of insulin and it pains me to see how this disease is destroying her body (and her spirit). I try so much to be supportive, and I try to guide her to make better life choices. I think that getting her this wonderful book might just be the answer. She doesn’t always listen to everything I tell her, but maybe if she reads this by a doctor, she will listen, at least to some of it. Thanks for the great review. I really appreciate it for me to help my friend.

In my opinion, it is due to the things we eat nowadays, look at the meat, it is full of hormones, everybody knows it, yet nothing is done against it. The reason is simple, there is too much money behind it, and studies that can show that are muffled away, so people are unknown to it.

Me and my wife only but organic food, and this helps a lot to prevent problems, neither of us are complaining about high insuline levels and so.

Also what causes obesity, is the huge amount of sugars, be careful when drinking sodas and so, because they can be a huge factor in it.

This is clearly an amazing book and I’m glad your review article has successfully highlighted this information! I’ve recently been diagnosed (last year) with Type 2 diabetes and have gained some knowledge that the condition is related to weight gain and obesity. Losing the weight is supposed to reduce or eliminate the disease, but losing the weight has not been easy. This book and your article shed new light on the issue of hormonal vs caloric weight gain.

I don’t know if Dr. Fung will be vilified here in the UK so much. I’ll tell you that I will bring this up with my doctor come January 2019, when I have my annual screening for Diabetes. One thing the National Health Service is good at here is preventative care and all regular medicines are provided as part of that care, including Metformin. But Metformin has nasty side effects and I’d like to eliminate it, period. I can do that through diet and exercise — I am told — by my Pharmacist. It will be interesting to see what the doctor says about this!

Thanks again for this book review! It looks like I need to get this one!

im so glad i found your website. As someone who’s BMI says he is bordering on obese, ive tried every diet and exercise regime out there. i even tried those so called “fat burner” tablets – FYI they dont work other than burn a hole in your wallet

I also feel obesity is in the genes – my mum’s side are all on the larger side, no matter how active they are or how little they eat – they just are chubby bubbies!

your article has opened my eyes and im definitely going to order this book..thanks for the post!

This is rather intriguing. I’ve read many times that the types of calories you intake certainly matter, but I didn’t quite realize what was happening behind the scenes. I knew that western culture in particular often drives us toward eating a lot of processed foods and simple carbohydrates which basically translate into huge spikes in blood sugar, but I wasn’t aware that fasting would help alleviate this type of behavior without having a negative impact.

I’ll definitely have to dig into this in more detail, especially after having read Grain Brain and seeing first hand how much the simple carbs and gluten we eat daily seems to have such a huge negative impact on our body too!

Thank you for sharing this information with the readers of this blog. Many people charge money to give people so called “secrets” or “life hacks”, yet you are sharing this all for free. It was shocking to discover the root cause of obesity because I never would have thought that it was overproduction of insulin. I look forward to reading more of your articles.

Love your slogan “healthy is the first wealthy” couldn’t agree more. I love learning new ways to optimize my health and fasting has been something that I have just begun diving into. But, with so much material out there it is sometimes hard to find actual credible information. So, thank you so much for finding this great information and sharing it. This book seems like a must-read for anyone struggling with obesity. I myself, do not have a problem with obesity but I will most definitely think of Dr. Fung when the topic comes up for those around me. So, thanks again for sharing this excellent book review.

You hit the nail on the head with saying Dr. Fung will probably be vilified for his statements on obesity.

I get the impression that big Pharma would not like it if doctors do not prescibe medicine as then the whole system would collapse. It is a lot more profitable when the total population remains sich. Fact is doctors are not being taught how to heal without medicine.

Low fat does not help at all, rather the contrary. Man-made foods are bad for your health, just look at the lables, one does not know the words and one cannot pronounce them either.

I fully agree with the intermittent fasting system. I am a big fan of fasting and have done it many times in my life.

A calorie is not a calorie, that is for sure. The Tokelauans who live in the South Pacific have a diet of 60% Coconut fat and they remain slim.

People will have to rethink the way they are eating and also what they are eating, personally I think the closer to nature the better.

Hi, Taetske. Nice to read your comment. Thank you for your info about the Tokelauan’s diet. I agree with you that the closer the food to nature the better. We should pay attention on how we prepare the food for our family.

Thank you so much for sharing your comprehensive, informative and very relevant article. The information was insightful and eye opening at the same-time. As an obese (considered by the BMI charts) woman myself, I believe I just read some literature that just might put me in the most healthiest state of my adult life. So many diets so many failures for me in the diet world from one thing or another.

Dr. Fung’s website was also comprehensive and informative. It gave me a new found interest, maybe I should say re-found interest, failed diets was a regular process for me.

Hi Melani, this is a great article and a great video of Dr. Jason Fung. And I believe that he’s so right, that the imbalance or the hormone system is the cause of the obesity explosion world wide. I know that I gained weight easily when I was pregnant, and also when I took the anti-conception pills. Not to mention the meno-pauze. All periods of hormonal imbalance. I will dive into this matter a bit more. How to adjust my dieet in a low-carb, high fat and intermittent fasting one. I found a lot of videos online on the dietdoktor(dot)com. Thank you for pointing out this Obesity Code Book to me.

Hi, Loes. I have no courage to take the anti-conception pills because I have heard that it will cause the overweight. This book is very interesting for me because I want to help my husband to lose weight. I apply intermittent fasting to be more alert and to look younger. Thank you for giving me the idea to research the correlation between menopause and body weight. Best regard, Melani.

I like the idea of intermittent fasting, I came up with the idea of not eating after lunch not long ago and here I am informing my self a bit more if this is a good idea.

Your post here is great but for sure I want to get that book so my wife can also take advantage of this I think not too hard diet concept.

My greatest problem is, I love to eat at night. After everybody is asleep I get hungry before I can fall asleep. If I could do intermittent fasting every day after lunch I think my overweight will soon go down.

Hi, Stefan. I believe that if there is a will there is a way. I’ve ever read on Crowdfire picture that pop corn, avocado, oat, hummus, Greek youghurt, banana, blueberry, and dark chocolate are the healthy snacks you can eat after 8 pm.

Obesity is definitely a problem that will not go away easily. I’m lucky that there doesn’t seem to be any genetic predisposition to obesity in my family. For future reference though, it’s good to see that there are programs and options available that don’t rely on drugs or surgery to help lose weight. Is this similar to the 5:2 diet at all?

This is a really interesting article, and amazing to read that the shift happened way back in 1977. It does make a lot of sense as never before have there been so many fat people in the world.

I have been reading up a lot lately on Intermittent fasting, and there seems to be more good hype than bad hype. I like the idea of fasting for 16 hours a day, as this makes it easier as you can do most of that fasting overnight.

This is a great article Melanie. I particularly find your insights on common assumptions out there regarding the whole obesity thing in general. I for one thought that all calories regardless of the source cause the same weight gain, well now I know the truth thanks to you. This among other insights now I know thanks to your very helpful article.

I have to grab myself Dr Jason’s ‘Cracking the Obesity Code’ book ASAP.

Obesity has dealt tremendously with so many people including some of my friends, my auntie and most people I see around. I kept on wondering if there is a way to help with it. Companies and even doctors don’t seem to help out.

Thanks so much for sharing this awesome book “Cracking The Obesity Code”.

It’s so Terrible with food restrictions, exercises and many other activities only to end up gaining more weight… This book will be a game changer.

Thanks for the information on obesity. I have heard that obesity is related to insulin overproduction. I know I am probably at high risk for type 2 diabetes since my father has it.

However, isn’t there something called pre diabetic, though? I know I should have a better diet and I want to make some simple changes to my diet. Do you happen to have 3 simple tips I can use for doing a more diabetic-friendly diet?

Prediabetes means have a higher than normal blood sugar level but not yet high enough to be the type 2 diabetes. Without lifestyle changes, people with prediabetes are very likely to progress to type 2.diabetes. Three simple tips for doing a more diabetic-friendly diet: choose high-fiber complex carbohydrate, be smart about sweets (moderation is the key), and choose fats wisely (the healthiest fats come from fish and plant sources).

This sounds wonderful! I am going to do a little research, but it sounds like something I can do easily enough. Some diets or ways to lose weight are just not that simple to follow. I can definitely do this. Have you used this before and how has it worked for you? I am glad it is a physical book, as I like to have it handy to read while in bed, etc.

Hi, Matt’s Mom. There are so many benefits of the intermittent fasting. It can overcome an allergy too. I do intermittent fasting to maintain my ideal body weight, be more alert, and to look younger. You may want to read the article here. I do the fasting three times a week by skipping my lunch. So I do 12 hours fasting. The result is I get the flat stomach. It is simple but it needs the discipline, ha ha. Drinking water can help when we feel hungry.

Hi, Melani, awesome article. This is definitely a book the obese population needs to read. In fact, your review was so well-written that I shared this among my own social network. I really like how you tackled the fact the medical community knew this and did nothing about it, plus the ultra-low calorie treatments failing time and again. Again, awesome article.

I am actually quite new to intermittent fasting and I really want to start it. As you mentioned it is really important to break the cycle of insulin resistance. However how long does it take to do intermittent fasting easily? Because I eat really frequently and I don’t want to feel much hunger during this period.

Hi. Fasting has no standard duration. Fasts can range from twelve hours

to three months or more. You can fast once a week or once a monthor once a year. Intermittent fasting involves fasting for shorter periodsof time on a regular basis. Shorter fasts are generally done morefrequently.

Some people prefer a daily sixteen-hour fast, which meansthat they eat all their meals within an eight-hour window. Longer fastsare typically twenty-four to thirty-six hours, done two to three timesper week.

Prolonged fasting may range from one week to one month.During a twenty-four-hour fast, you fast from dinner (or lunch orbreakfast) the first day until dinner (or lunch or breakfast) the nextday. Practically, this means missing breakfast, lunch and snacks on thefasting day and only eating a single meal (dinner). Essentially, you skiptwo meals as you fast from 7:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. the next day.

Cracking the obesity code seems to debunk the myth that eating healthy is expensive. The thing about eating is that it is pleasurable and sometimes some people can get carried away for various reasons.

But knowing how to manage eating habits is really important along with understanding how our body works can clearly be extremely helpful. With an opportunity for a lower food bill, who would not want to try the suggested strategies, especially when they work! I’d definitely recommend anyone facing the challenge of obesity to grab a copy of this book.

Hey Melani, your article was awesome. You made so many good points in it like the misconception that losing weight, while using a regime, doesn’t guarantee weight loss. I’ve never had problems with weight but I do know many that have and this article would serve them well and so I’ll be forwarding it onto them because of the great info that lies within. Great job!

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